I have this stuff covering a lot of my plants in my tank. I’m guessing it is some type of freshwater cnidarian as it retracts when touched. Haven’t seen any damage to anything yet (as you would with Hydra) but worried if it is a cnidarian it may eventually take it’s toll on fry etc. Currently no fish in the tank, but lots of snails, daphnia and cyclops and probably other ‘pond life’ that I don’t recognise, and just added a few cherry shrimp hoping they might try to eat the stuff.

Not sure how to eradicate or control it, snails do nothing and so far shrimps haven’t touched it.

Please help. Sorry for the terrible photo, just can’t get any closer with my camera.

Yeh I was hoping not to use any type of chemical control, too worried about how much it will disturb the rest of my critters. Might try some larger snails like a ramshorn. Maybe if I can work out exactly what it is then I can work out what it’s feeding on, or a susceptible stage in it’s life cycle?

@oaken said:
Not sure what it is, but if it’s related to Hydra you can get rid of it with a bit of flubendazol. It is supposedly safe for shrimp and everything else, as well.

It will kill snails.

If you get the dose right (I use 10% solution at 1ml per 50litres) then you shouldn’t kill off snails. At least, my pond snails and ramshorns showed no ill effects, couldn’t vouch for other species. Shrimp and fish were also all fine including somewhat sensitive species such as Parosphromenus and Otocinclus.

If you get the dose right (I use 10% solution at 1ml per 50litres) then you shouldn’t kill off snails. At least, my pond snails and ramshorns showed no ill effects, couldn’t vouch for other species. Shrimp and fish were also all fine including somewhat sensitive species such as Parosphromenus and Otocinclus.

Worth using if you can’t find a more natural solution.

Good to know Tom. I follow this dosing and it will eradicate pond snails.